Guinness World Record 2011

After founding the Guinness Book of Records at 107 Fleet Street, the first 197-page edition was bound on 27 August 1955 and went to the top of the British bestseller lists by Christmas. "It was a marketing give away—it wasn't supposed to be a money maker," said Beaver. The following year it was launched in the U.S., and it sold 70,000 copies.
Because the book became a surprise hit, many further editions were printed, eventually settling into a pattern of one revision a year, published in October to coincide with Christmas sales. The McWhirters continued to publish it and related books for many years. Both brothers had an encyclopedic memory — on the TV series Record Breakers, based upon the book, they would take questions posed by children in the audience on various world records, and would usually be able to give the correct answer. Ross McWhirter was assassinated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in 1975. Following McWhirter's assassination, the feature in the show where questions about records posed by children were answered was called "Norris on the Spot".
Guinness World Records Limited was formed in 1954 to publish the first book.
Sterling Publishing owned the rights to the Guinness book in the 1970s and under their management, the book became a household name in the USA.